The Competitiveness of Nations
in a Global Knowledge-Based Economy
H.H. Chartrand
May 2002
Eugene F. Miller
Positivism, Historicism, and Political
Inquiry
American Political Science
Review
Volume 66, Issue
3
Sept. 1972,
796-817
Index
Epistemological Issues That Divide Positivism and
Historicism
The Revolt Against Positivism in the Philosophy of
Science
The Growth of Historicism in American Political
Science
Conclusion: Beyond Positivism and Historicism in
Political Inquiry
The Growth of Historicism
in American Political
Science
Thus far I have given attention to the emergence of
historicism in
Our task now is to examine the recent flowering of
historicism in American political science. While traditional currents of American
thought, such as pragmatism, have no doubt contributed to this development,
there are four sources of historicist influence which seem particularly
important and whose impact I wish to consider: (1) antipositivist writings in
the philosophy and history of science; (2) writings in the sociology of
knowledge that adopt the position of Karl Mannheim: (3) recent work in
existential phenomenology; and (4) the thought of Friedrich Nietzsche. Of the political scientists who draw from
these sources, some freely
24. For example, Ernest Nagel has conceded that “the
principle of causality” (his term for what others have called the principle of
the uniformity of nature) must be regarded as an indispensable or logically
necessary maxim by anyone who chooses to adopt the goals of explanation and
control as conceived by modern science. Yet he admits that the choice between
modern theoretical science and other views of knowledge is itself historically
contingent and logically arbitrary. In other words, there seems to be no
basis in reason, nature, or history for regarding the underlying assumptions of
modern science as more true or valid than those that underlie any other type of
explanation that might be chosen by men of another epoch. See The Structure of Science, pp.
316-324.
806
embrace a thoroughgoing relativism, while others avoid
or resist the conclusion that genuine or final knowledge is impossible. I shall attempt to show that relativism
becomes unavoidable once certain premises of historicism are
granted.
In justifying their particular conception of science,
advocates of a behavioral approach have commonly invoked the authority of the
philosophy of science. They have
assumed - and a generation of political scientists has been taught to believe -
that there exists within the philosophy of science a consensus favoring a
positivistic conception of scientific inquiry. We have seen, however, that there is a
basic conflict about the nature of science within the philosophy of science
itself, arising from the broader dispute at the level of epistemology about the
character of human knowledge. Ironically, a revolt against positivism
was beginning in the philosophy of science at about the time that political
scientists were adopting the positivistic model of scientific inquiry as the
basis for their own revolution. By
the time the behavioral revolution had reached its objective, the shape of
things in the philosophy of science had changed dramatically. Nevertheless, the methodological
literature in political science continues to treat the positivistic model as
though it enjoyed the full endorsement of philosophers of science. The writing of such men as Kuhn and
Hanson are, in fact, often cited in support of the behavioralists’ program, with
little apparent recognition of the extent to which their views jeopardize the
very foundations of behavioralism.
One political scientist who has drawn attention to the
lag or gulf between contemporary work in the philosophy of science and political
scientists’ perceptions of that field is John Gunnell. Agreeing generally with the
epistemological position of such antipositivists as Kuhn, Hanson, Toulmin, and
Feyerabend, Gunnell questions several features of the positivist conception of
science, particularly its deductive model of explanation. The deductive model, he charges, is not
an accurate representation of the actual logic of inquiry in natural science.
And even if this logic were
accurate insofar as natural science is concerned, there would be no basis for
insisting that social science should conform to it. The canons of scientific inquiry for a
particular field must be determined by scientists who work in that field and not
by some outside authority. 21 This is not to say that Gunnell is without convictions
of his own regarding the proper approach to political inquiry. He would replace the behavioral approach
with one that draws from the insights of Max Weber, the later Wittgenstein, and
phenomenologists such as Alfred Schutz. In brief, Gunnell argues that each
society organizes itself around certain symbolic forms, which determine its view
of social reality and define for its members the possibilities of action. The meaning of human action is to be
found in the symbolic context from which it arises. The task of the social scientist is to
illuminate the symbolic contexts that give meaning to action in various
societies. To explain action is to
give its meaning for the actor by reference to symbols and concepts that are
operative in the social situation. 26
Gunnell wishes to throw off the burden that a slavish
adherence to the positivist model has imposed on political inquiry, but one must
wonder if that effort can succeed on the grounds on which he has chosen to base
it. He could reach his objective by
arguing, on philosophical grounds, that the human things are essentially
different from the nonhuman things and must be understood by methods of inquiry
that are different from those now employed in natural science. In fact, he seems to take this very path
in defending his own view of explanation against that of logical empiricism, for
he holds that social science must deal not with a “first order reality,” like
the natural world of concern to physical science, but with a “second order
reality,” namely, “a world of intersubjectively shared symbols, a logically
ordered world that has been pre-constituted by the participants and in whose
terms action is conducted and justified,” 27
Here Gunnell seems to argue that a
variety of methods is required by the nature of things and the nature of
understanding. In another context,
however, he attempts to protect social science against the doctrinaire claims of
a particular school of philosophy by rejecting
25. Gunnell, “Deduction, Explanation, and Social
Scientific Inquiry,” American Political Science Review, 63 (December,
1969), 1233-1246. The same issue
contains replies to Gunnell by Arthur S. Goldberg and A. James Gregor, along
with a rejoinder by Gunnell, pp. 1247-1262. Gunnell draws upon antipositivist
accounts of theory and observation to oppose the prevailing epistemological
assumptions of political scientists in “The Idea of the Conceptual Framework: A
Philosophical Critique,” Journal of Comparative Administration, I
(August, 1969), 140-176. Thomas
Landon Thorson’s Biopolitics (New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1970)
is another work by a political scientist that discusses sympathetically the
antipositivist revolt in the philosophy of science.
26. Gunnell, “Social Science and Political
Reality: The Problem of Explanation,” Social Research, 35 (Spring, 1968),
159-201.
27. Gunnell, in Social Research, p.
180.
807
philosophy altogether as the measure of empirical
science. He adopts the view of Kuhn
and others that the meaning of science for a particular field is determined
entirely by convention, or by the existing “paradigm”:
The meaning of “science” at any time or place is
determined by the paradigm which informs scientific activity and reasoning and
which specifies the conception of reality and the phenomena to be investigated,
designates problems for investigation, and determines the criteria of acceptable
explanation and inference. 28
Philosophy can analyze and clarify the language of
science and explore problems that science raises, but it cannot provide an
authoritative critique of the “framework of ideas about reality, theories, and
rules which together constitute a paradigm or conceptual scheme for interpreting
and organizing experience.” 29 Gunnell denies that this contextualist approach abandons
the ideals of objectivity and intersubjectivity, but he admits that objective or
inter-subjective standards in science are always relative to a particular
context or paradigm. Neither logic
nor epistemology can establish “transcontextual standards” for
science.
By holding that the meaning of science at any time or
place is relative to the prevailing paradigm, Gunnell may win his battle against
those outside of social science who would impose on it a reconstruction of
scientific method based on natural science, but he has left social science at
the mercy of whatever paradigm should arise there from fate or choice. Let us suppose that contrary to Gunnell’s
wishes, the method of natural science comes to be accepted as the de facto
paradigm in the social sciences. His contextualist position leaves us with
no philosophical basis for questioning its authority. In order to be strictly consistent,
Gunnell would have to concede that his own preferred methodology is but a
recommendation to the community of social scientists about a possible consensus
or paradigm for inquiry. He has
undermined any possible claim that it is founded upon a transcontextual grasp of
the nature of things or of reality. The basis for Gunnell’s position is not
so much a belief in the autonomy of scientific inquiry as a scepticism about the
capacity of philosophy itself to move from opinions, or conventional
representations of reality, to knowledge of the nature of things. Philosophical speculation, like
scientific, religious, and common-sense thinking, must take place within its own
distinctive paradigm or conceptual framework which, we may suppose, is
ultimately conventional or historical. Gunnell might avoid the relativism that
is implicit in the position of Kuhn and others and find a secure foundation for
his own methodology by granting that the mind can transcend all paradigms or
presuppositions and test them by its grasp of the permanent structure of
reality. He holds instead that all
thought and observation are relative to some particular community’s
conceptualization of the real world. 30
Sheldon Wolin has considered both behavioral and
traditional political theory in light of the new interpretation of science.
In “Paradigms and Political
Theories,” 31 Wolin
develops Kuhn’s position at length, drawing attention, we must note, to the
arbitrary element that is involved in the choice of scientific paradigms. He shows quite effectively that Kuhn’s
interpretation undercuts the assumptions about the nature and development of
science that have guided the behavioral movement in political science. He goes on to argue that the history of
political theory can be understood in terms of Kuhn’s model of scientific
development. In particular, he
compares the role of the “epic theories” in the history of political thought to
that of paradigms in the history of science. In his view such epic theorists as Plato,
Aristotle, Machiavelli, Hobbes, Locke, and Marx “considered theorizing to be an
activity aimed at the creation of new paradigms.” 32 These
“paradigm-creators” established new visions of the political world which were
then applied and developed by less original theorists,
28. Gunnell, “Deduction, Explanation, and Social Science
Inquiry,” p. 1244.
29. Gunnell, “Deduction, Explanation ...,“ pp.
1245-46.
30. Gunnell’s position may be contrasted with the more
cautious position of Berger and Luckmann, to which I refer later. He does not restrict himself to the
methodological assertion that the social scientist must grasp a society’s
understanding of social reality in order to explain action within that society.
He seems to embrace the
philosophical or epistemological view that all definitions of social reality are
relative to some community and, furthermore, that one can never move beyond
these various definitions to a true understanding of the nature of society as
such. See particularly Gunnell’s
“Social Science and Political Reality,” pp. 184-186. Neither reason nor experience offers a
standpoint on which an objective understanding of social reality can be
based. The attempt to construct an
independent definition of social reality by reasoning must employ arbitrary or
contingent assumptions (pp. 160-68). Moreover, an objective account of social
reality cannot be built on experience because there are no independent or
autonomous observations. (pp. 178- 80).
31. In Politics and Experience: Essays
Presented to Michael Oakeshott, ed.
32. Wolin, in Politics and Experience, pp.
139-140.
808
or “paradigm workers,” who correspond to the “normal
scientists” of Kuhn’s analysis. Wolin argues further that political
societies may also be understood as embodiments of paradigms of an operative
kind, namely, the totality of institutions, practices, and beliefs in accordance
with which the society carries on its political life: Two important points are made about the
relationship of theoretical and operative paradigms. First, the epic political theorist,
unlike the extraordinary theorist in natural science, seeks to change the world
about which he speculates (i:e:, the social world) and not merely the way men
look at the world. He may
accomplish this by persuading rulers to adopt his theory as the social paradigm
or by winning acceptance for it in the universities. Second, the major political theories are
a response not to a theoretical crisis but to a political crisis, to a condition
in which the operative paradigm of society cannot adapt to challenges or
changes. The theory seeks to
discredit and to replace the operative paradigm. Wolin closes with a suggestion about the
nature of the paradigm that guides behavioral studies in political science:
Its assumptions and criteria are
derived not from a general theory but from the operative paradigm of the liberal
or democratic regime in which it is conducted.
In a subsequent essay, “Political Theory as a Vocation,”
33 Wolin develops much the same position, but expands his
analysis and critique of behavioralism. Specifically, he argues that a belief in
the primacy of method, resembling the methodological emphasis of Descartes, is
the distinguishing feature of the behavioral movement. In the absence of a general theory, the
assumptions about man and society that guide behavioral research have been drawn
from the prevailing political ideology. Consequently, the goodness or normality
of the established system is presupposed in research and theorizing alike. Empirical theories may provide
explanations of why things happen as they do, but they can offer “no significant
choice or critical analysis of the quality, direction, or fate of public life.”
34 Wolin
contends that it is the vocation of the political theorist to offer a critique
of the established order and a vision of new possibilities. He criticizes contemporary education in
political science for depreciating that “tacit political knowledge” which is a
precondition of critical theory.
Wolin’s analysis provides another illustration of the
manner in which historicist arguments originating in the philosophy of science
can be used against behavioral political science. Yet as in Gunnell’s case, there is no
evidence that Wolin can avoid the relativistic implications of these arguments
for political theory itself. The
central problem to emerge from Wolin’s discussion is the epistemological status
of the “epic political theories.” This problem is not dealt with directly,
but a solution is implied. Wolin
would certainly deny that political theory is merely a reflection of the
prevailing worldview of society. By
definition, theory must be critical of established opinions and institutions.
In Wolin’s account, theory is more
a source than a consequence of society’s operative paradigm. In the final analysis, however, theories
seem to rest on presuppositions whose truth or congruence with nature cannot be
established conclusively by reason or experience. Let us recall that Wolin likens an epic
political theory to a scientific paradigm in Kuhn’s sense of the term. He emphasizes the fact that for Kuhn,
there is no objective way of deciding among competing paradigms. An “arbitrary element” ultimately guides
the selection. It is a commitment
that must rest on faith, not on a cognitive grasp of nature or reality as it is.
Now, Wolin points to several
differences between political theories and scientific paradigms, but he never
denies that they are alike in the ultimate arbitrariness of their fundamental
assumptions. It is not merely
Wolin’s silence here that leads one to believe that political theories are
finally arbitrary. We may note that
he speaks consistently of “choosing” or “creating” a theory rather than of
developing or discovering theoretical knowledge. Granting that the theorist can be “highly
self-conscious” about choosing among theoretical alternatives, 35 does nature
provide a standard for guiding the choice? Wolin adopts the argument of Kuhn,
Hanson, and others to the effect that we perceive “facts” only through concepts
that are usually derived from a theory. Creativity and imagination must play a
large part in theorizing because facts are not univocal. But is “nature” also relative to a
theoretical commitment, or is it there prior to theorizing to be discovered as
it is? It seems doubtful that Wolin
would concede this, even though he claims to be restating the older
understanding of theory, of the bios theoretikos. One suspects that Wolin has liberated
theory not merely from bondage to empirical fact but from any obligation to
represent nature or reality as it is:
A solution to our problem seems to
depend
33. Wolin, “Political Theory as a Vocation,” American
Political Science Review, 63 (December, 1969),
1062-1082.
34. Wolin, “Political Theory as a Vocation,” p.
1063.
35. Wolin, “Political Theory,” p. 1075
809
on Wolin’s understanding of what he, following Michael
Polanyi, calls “tacit knowledge.”
Wolin contends that political theory is built on tacit political
knowledge. More specifically, the
source of theoretical vision and creativity is “the stock of ideas which an
intellectually curious and broadly educated person accumulates and which come to
govern his intuitions, feelings, and perceptions.” But are these “ideas” themselves the
result of vision, of the mind’s grasp of the nature of things? Wolin speaks of them as “human
creations,” not as discoveries. As
presuppositions of thought, they rarely find theoretical expression. They “bear a family resemblance to
‘bias.’” It would appear that they
are historically conditioned and, with respect to their rational ground,
arbitrary. 36
Turning now to our second source, we must note that Karl
Mannheim’s writings have been less influential in political science than in
sociology, where the sociology of knowledge has been an established field for
more than three decades. He is
perhaps best known among political scientists for his discussion of the concept
of ideology. It is important to
recognize that
The difficulties inherent in this undertaking come to
light in William E. Connolly’s Political Science and
Ideology.
38 Connolly agrees with
36. Wolin, “Political Theory,” pp. 1073-1074. Wolin refers us to Michael Polanyi, but
Polanyi’s stand regarding the problem of historicism is not altogether clear.
Marjorie Grene, in The Knower
and the Known (London: Faber and Faber, 1966), emphasizes the similarity of
Polanyi’s approach to the Lebensphilosophie of Dilthey and the
existential phenomenology of Merleau-Ponty. On the other hand, Helmut Kuhn argues
that Polanyi does nothing less than overcome the “crisis of the philosophical
tradition generally known under the title of “historicism.’” According to Kuhn, Polanyi regards
genuine knowledge not as a creation of the mind but as the mind’s discovery of
the character of reality through contact with it. See Kuhn’s “Personal Knowledge and the
Crisis of the Philosophical Tradition,” in Intellect and Hope: Essays in the
Thought of Michael Polanyi, ed. Thomas A. Langford and William H. Poteat
(Durham: Duke University Press, 1968), pp. 111-135, Wolin does not indicate
which of these interpretations he would prefer.
Other writings of Wolin seem also to take a position that
is implicitly relativistic. In
Politics and Vision (Boston: Little, Brown, 1960), pp. 17-21, he
distinguishes between two meanings of vision, i.e., “objective” vision, which
seeks to describe an object or event dispassionately, and “imaginative” vision,
which constructs models that reflect the theorist’s own fundamental values.
Imaginative vision, it would seem,
is always from a “perspective” and cannot claim to grasp reality as it is. The perspectival character of theory is
emphasized also in “Political Theory: Trends and Goals,” International
Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences, ed. David L. Sills (New York: Macmillan
and The Free Press, 1968), XII, 318-331, where Wolin asks: “Does each
theory present us with a different political world? Is political theory a bedlam of
subjectivity and relativism? How
does one decide whether one theory is truer than another? Is the history of political theory merely
a succession of different theories, instead of successive additions to our
knowledge and understanding of politics?” Having raised the crucial issues, he
replies that “[t]hese questions cannot be answered here, even assuming that they
can be answered satisfactorily at all” (pp. 322-323). His statements about the nature of facts
and concepts seem, however, to rule out the very possibility of a definitive
understanding of nature or reality.
37. Ideology and Utopia, trans. Louis Wirth and
Edward Shils (New York: Harcourt Brace, 1949), pp. 55-108.
38. Connolly, Political Science and Ideology (New
York, Atherton Press, 1967).
810
i.e., systems of beliefs or empirical claims which
purport to describe and explain the social and political environment. An ideology grows out of a
perspective. It construes the
environment in ways that are congruent with and supportive of that
perspective. It contains beliefs
and assumptions about the world that have not been fully tested, but which are
accepted, as it were, on faith. It
resists falsification by assimilating information in ways that protect these
assumptions, as well as the individual’s higher level beliefs and
values.
Connolly refuses to agree with those who hold that
political inquiry is inherently ideologcal or subjective. He accepts the scientific ideal of
political inquiry, the goal of which is to replace ideology by scientific
theory, whose assumptions and concepts are defined explicitly and precisely and
whose propositions about the world have withstood empirical testing. Yet given the perspectival character of
human thought, is there reason to believe that this goal can be achieved? Connolly admits that we can never raise
all of our presuppositions and concepts to the level of consciousness. He concedes that we experience the world
and interpret our experience in conformity with our broader perspective. He seems to grant that the scientific
ideal is unattainable in practice. He does not believe, however, that
his epistemological premises undercut the scientific ideal in principle -
a conclusion that is certainly open to question. Let us concede that the scientific ideal
is valid in principle, which, for Connolly, means that no one has established
conclusively that it cannot be attained. What reason is there to pursue a goal
that seems for all practical purposes to be unattainable? One might argue that the goal of modern
science, though unattainable in practice, represents the perfection of the human
understanding, the highest and most natural attainment of the mind. The great thinkers who laid the
epistemological foundations of modern science took this position. Connolly is not willing to claim,
however, that the logic of modern science, or its method, or its criteria of
validation, are inherently sounder or more natural than those belonging to any
other mode of thought. He accepts
Whereas phenomenology has served as a foundation for
psychological and sociological inquiry for decades, especially in
39. See Berger and Luckmann, The Social Construction
of Reality (Garden City: Doubleday, 1966), pp. 1-17. Berger and Luckmann concede that the
philosopher, as opposed to the sociologist, is obligated “to obtain maximal
clarity as to the ultimate status of what the man in the street believes to be
‘reality’ and ‘knowledge.’ Put
differently, the philosopher is driven to decide where the quotation marks are
in order and where they may safely be omitted, that is, to differentiate between
valid and invalid assertions about the world” (p. 2). One must wonder, however, why social
scientists should not attempt to understand opinions about social reality in
light of what is really true of society.
40. See Surkin’s “Sense and Non-sense in
Politics,” in An End to Political Science, ed. Marvin Surkin and Alan
Wolfe (New York: Basic Books, 1970), pp. 13-33. This essay is a slight modification of
one that appeared earlier in PS, 2 (Fall, 1969), 573-581. Surkin here outlines a methodology for
political science based on existential phenomenology and indicts the behavioral
approach on grounds similar to those of Wolin. Despite its claim to objectivity and
value neutrality, behavioralism is said to reflect the prevailing ideology and
to serve the dominant institutions of [American
society. Surkin does not claim that his alternative methodology is any less
evaluative, ideological, or contingent than behavioral methodology, for in his
view, all claims to truth and all modes of philosophical and social inquiry are
contingent and socially determined.
His methodology is fundamentally different from behavioralism in this
respect: recognizing its own contingent and ideological character, it dedicates
itself to criticizing and changing the existing society rather than to
preserving it.]
HHC: [bracketed] displayed on p. 812 of original
811
Of those who have criticized the behavioral approach
from a phenomenological standpoint, Hwa Yol Jung provides us with the most
detailed statements on the implications of existential phenomenology for
political inquiry. 41 Jung describes existential phenomenology as the
outgrowth of efforts by such thinkers as Heidegger, Sartre, Merleau-Ponty, Paul
Ricoeur, and John Wild to synthesize and go beyond the existential thought
initiated by Kierkegaard and the phenomenological thought initiated by Husserl.
The method of existential
phenomenology is essentially descriptive. It seeks to elucidate the reality of
man’s “being in the world” by describing rigorously the meaning of his concrete
experience in what Husserl came to call the Lebenswelt (life-world).
The life-world is that primordial
and familiar world of everyday existence which we take for granted as the
archetype of reality.
Three characteristics of the life-world are regarded by
Jung as especially important for political inquiry. First, the life-world has meaningful
patterns and structures which we apprehend prior to reflection through immediate
experience or feeling. It is a
world not of “what ‘I think’ but of what ‘I live through.’” This world of “lived experience” is a
preconceptual or pretheoretical world. It is “pregiven” to the theorist, i.e.,
presupposed as the foundation of any explicit act of conceptualization in
philosophy or science. Second, the
life-world is the theater of action. We participate in it primarily as actors
or doers rather than as thinkers. Our active participation in the
life-world is to be understood in a dual sense. On the one hand, the life-world serves as
the indispensable basis of human action.
It is permeated by values, meanings, concerns, and interests that enter
into our motivational field and help to determine what we do. On the other hand, the reality of
everyday existence is itself created or constituted by action or work. The meaningful objects of consciousness
come to view in accordance with the underlying aims or projects of human action.
The life-world is a field of
pragmata. Things in nature
as well as cultural artifacts are defined in terms of their serviceability,
usability and manipulability. In
sum, action involves both a response to the life-world as given and a projection
beyond it toward the creation of new meaning or reality. Finally, the life-world is an
intersubjective or socialized world. It “refers to the complex living
relationships of man to man in culture, in society, in history, and in
politics.” In everyday life the
existence of other selves is never in doubt, for we experience them
immediately. Cultural artifacts,
especially language, attest to the social character of everyday existence; and
our actions are always structured with a view to the reactions and responses of
others. 42
Jung’s critique of behavioralism rests on his contention
that theoretical knowledge should be founded upon and consonant with our
immediate experience of the life-world.
For example, a proper definition of a political concept such as
“democracy” requires us to turn directly to our “felt or tacit meaning” of
democracy. Jung finds, however,
that the behavioral approach characteristically formulates its concepts and
constructs its models in abstraction from the totality of lived experience. In its eagerness to predict the course
of behavior, behavioralism fails to describe political phenomena accurately or
to elucidate their meaning. Jung’s
comparison of behavioralism and phenomenology centers primarily around their
respective approaches to the study of human action. The distinctiveness of the
phenomenology-
41. See especially Hwa Yol Jung, “The Political
Relevance of Existential Phenomenology,” Review of Politics, 33 (October,
1971), 538-563. A revised version
of this essay appears as the Introduction to Existence, Sociality and
Political Reality: A Reader in Existential Phenomenology (Chicago: Regnery,
1972). My analysis of Jung’s
thought would have been impossible were it not for his generosity in providing
me with a copy of the manuscript of “The Political Relevance of Existential
Phenomenology,” which appeared in print only after the completion of my essay.
I have also made use of a revised
version of Jung’s “A Phenomenological Critique of the Behavioral Persuasion in
Politics: A Philosophical View,” which was delivered at the 1971 Annual Meeting
of the American Political Science Association. Other writings by Jung on existential
phenomenology and politics include: “The Radical Humanization of Politics:
Maurice Merleau-Ponty’s Philosophy of Politics,” Archiv Fur Rechts und
Sozialphilosophie, 53 (1967), 233-256; “Leo Strauss’s Conception of
Political Philosophy: A Critique,” Review of Politics, 29 (October,
1967), 492-517: and “Confucianism and Existentialism: Intersubjectivity as the
Way of Man,” Philosophy and Phnomenological Research, 30 (December,
1969), 186- 202. For a general
account of the influence of phenomenology on social science, see Fred R.
Dallmayr, “Existential Phenomenology and Social Science: An Overview and
Appraisal,” which will appear in 1972 in a collection of essays on phenomenology
to be edited by Edward Casey and David Carr and to be published by the
Quadrangle Press.
42. Jung, “The Political Relevance of Existential
Phenomenology,” pp. 540-543
812
cal approach is said to lie in its concern for the
meaning of human action, that is, the intended meaning which the actor imputes
to his action. Action always
embodies a preconceived project, a practical determination of what is to be
done. Behind the project is a
motive, which consists of a reason for doing something as well as a force that
initiates bodily movement. It is
especially in the reason for an action that we find its meaning. Behavioralism is unable to grasp the
meaning of action because of its commitment to study human phenomena with the
methods of the natural sciences. It
fails to recognize that these methods, while appropriate for the investigation
of merely natural things, are unsuited for the study of human beings, who are
capable of endowing their actions and perceptions with meaning. In order to adhere to its canons of
scientific methodology, behavioralism must restrict itself to the study of overt
behavior and, to the extent that it is concerned with intentions, beliefs,
motives, feelings, or values, attempt to infer them from the external
indications of action. Without
denying the significance of what is observable from the outside, “phenomenology
attempts to focus on and capture the meaning of action as the actor lives
through it…43 A phenomenological approach in political science would
understand political events in light of their meanings as interpreted by
political actors themselves. This
intended meaning is accessible through our experience of the life-world, which
is a structure of shared meanings. Our immersion in the life-world allows us
to understand the meaning of human action as participants and not simply as
observers. 44
Jung is quite aware that existential phenomenology has
been identified by some of its critics as a type of historicism. He denies that this philosophical
standpoint leads to an historical relativism, 45 but there
is reason to doubt that this outcome can be avoided. We have taken note of an emphasis within
the empiricist and positivist traditions on the mind’s immediate consciousness
of pure, unconceptualized experience that is intrinsically meaningful and that
can serve as an absolute ground of general knowledge. While this position is called to mind by
Jung’s insistence that conceptual or theoretical knowledge must rest upon and be
judged by preconceptual experience, he in fact departs from it radically both by
opposing the reduction of experience to mere “sense data” and by holding that
meanings are actively constituted by consciousness.
In considering Jung’s stand with regard to the source of
meaning, one finds it helpful to know that there has been disagreement within
existential phenomenology on the relationship of consciousness to the world.
Some writings, such as Heidegger’s
Being and Time and Sartre’s Being and Nothingness, indicate that
the individual consciousness constitutes its world and endows it with meaning.
A meaningful world arises from the
willful projects of the individual who cares about his own existence. Other writings stress that there is a
meaningful world prior to individual consciousness in which the individual lives
and in relation to which his consciousness emerges. In the later writings of Heidegger, for
example, the world of appearances is described not as the creation of will but
rather as a revelation of “gift” of Being to which men surrender
themselves. Merleau-Ponty holds
that the life-world in which we find ourselves is already there as a structured
and meaningful world prior to our perception of its meaning. This is not to deny that our
preconstituted world results from some prior human activity, such as that of a
preceding generation, or that its meaning evolves and changes, partly as the
result of our own actions.
There are overtones of Sartre and the early Heidegger in
Jung’s writings. He insists quite
strongly that experience is not meaningful per se but that we endow it with
meaning by our projects. Inasmuch
as “reality is constituted by the meaning of our experiences,” 46
we must conclude that the real world
is a construct of human consciousness. Nevertheless, Jung agrees with
Merleau-Ponty that meaning or reality is not simply relative to individual
actors. Action takes place within a
world of shared meanings. Men who
share a life-world or culture hold a common view of reality. The essential point, however, is that
Jung would not hold that meaningful experience or reality is simply given to a
passive consciousness, as is perhaps suggested by his references to our
common-sense understanding of social and political things as “immediate” and
“preconceptual.” The social reality
which the theorist attempts to describe is actively constructed in everyday life
and thought.
Jung writes that the life-world is “dynamic and
changing, which means that it is historical. As there are different cultures in
history, moreover, there are different versions of the
life-
43. Jung, “Political Relevance,” p.
562.
44. Jung, “Political Relevance,” pp.
547-553,
45. See Jung, “Leo Strauss’s Conception of
Political Philosophy,” pp. 509-514.
46. Jung, “The Political Relevance of Existential
Phenomenology”, p. 541.
813
world.” 47 It follows that views of reality attendant upon these
different versions of the life-world are relative to time and place. Given these principles, it would seem
that Jung can avoid an historical relativism only by granting that philosophy or
science can transcend the horizons of particular versions of the life-world and
discover permanent truths in nature or history. In keeping with the characteristic
emphasis of existential phenomenology, he appears to deny the possibility of
such transcendence. He criticizes
those approaches to philosophy such as Plato’s which look beyond the world of
appearances in search of reality. The search for a permanent “nature” would
be fruitless in any event, for nature has a history, i.e., natural objects are
the products of involved consciousness and as such are inherently
changeable. The task of theoretical
reflection is to describe the meaning of experience as it is found in the
life-world. Jung does suggest that
the study of the life-world in its different versions would reveal invariant
structures or essential types that lend themselves to theoretical formulation.
One is reminded of Dilthey’s effort
late in life to locate the types of human behavior and stylistic forms through a
comparative study of Weltanschauungen. Yet Dilthey’s own teaching about the
historicity of thought makes questionable the presupposition that would seem
necessary to the search for a reliable typology, namely, the presupposition that
a standpoint outside the flux of history can be gained for contemplating the
variety of historical types. Jung’s
search for the essential structures and types of the life-world is likewise
called into question by his insistence that science itself is a human project or
praxis undertaken by human beings immersed in a particular life-world.
The theorist is left with no solid
base on which to stand.
Jung indicates that the invariant principles to be
discovered by a phenomenological study of the life-world will concern the
structure of human action and consciousness. At the same time, he denies that man has
a constant and universal nature or, indeed, any permanently fixed properties at
all.
As an active doer, man is always in the making or on the
way. He is what he makes of
himself, and he molds his future by his action. Thus man has neither fixed properties nor
a predetermined future. The idea
that man is always an open possibility constitutes his radical historicity.
48
Yet if there is no human nature, what basis is there for
general assertions about the structure of action and consciousness or even about
man’s “being in the world”? There
can be no assurance that patterns of life occurring in the past or the present
will hold in the future. Even if
there is no fixed nature of man to be discovered, general knowledge might yet be
possible if man’s historical development has moved according to inflexible laws
that become visible to theorists in the culminating stage of history. Jung rejects even this Hegelian solution
to the problem of epistemological relativism: “The events of history are the
making of human consciousness and intervention rather than blind, impersonal
forces beyond human control. Nothing is ‘historically inevitable.’”
49 There is much to be learned from
Jung’s reexamination of the philosophical foundations of political inquiry, but
he does not provide us with a genuine alternative to an historical
relativism.
I have suggested that Nietzsche is the most important
precursor of twentieth-century historicism. Until recently, American political
theorists were quite hostile to Nietzsche, largely, it would seem, because of
his reputation as an enemy of liberal democracy and a forerunner of fascism.
In the past decade, however,
Nietzsche’s epistemological principles have been restated in a succession of
books and articles by Henry Kariel, 50
who has emerged as the most important
and effective spokesman for radical historicism in American political science.
In Kariel’s view, Nietzsche was
first to give power-
47. Jung, “Political Relevance,” p.
543.
48. Jung, “Political Relevance,” p.
542.
49. This quotation appears in the revised
manuscript of “The Political Relevance of Existential Phenomenology,” p. 13, but
not in the version of the essay that appeared in Review of
Politics,
50. See especially Kariel, “Nietzsche’s
Preface to Constitutionalism,” Journal of Politics, 25 (May, 1963),
211-225; In Search of Authority (New York: Free Press, 1964); The
Promise of Politics (Englewood Cliffs: Prentice-HaIl, 1966); “The Political
Relevance of Behavioral and Existential Psychology,” American Political
Science Review, 61 (June, 1967), 334-342; Open Systems (Itasca, Ill,:
Peacock, 1969): “Expanding the Political Present,” American Political Science
Review, 63 (September, 1969), 768-776; and “Creating Political Reality,”
American Political Science Review, 64 (December, 1970), 1088-1098. Kariel’s position is developed
comprehensively in his forthcoming book, Saving Appearances, which I have
had the privilege to examine in manuscript form. Kariel here argues forcefully against the
possibility of a final or objective insight into “nature” or “reality”: “Our
knowledge is inescapably fiction, illusion, myth, ideology, and
rationalization.” He calls
attention once more to Nietzsche’s influence on this view of knowledge, but the
contribution of other thinkers, such as Hobbes, Kant, and Schopenhauer are also
examined. His discussion of
American pragmatism brings out its relativistic tendencies with particular
clarity. A critique of Kariel’s
thought is offered in Marvin Zetterbaum, “Self and Political Order,”
Interpretation, 2 (Winter, 1970), 233-246.
814
ful expression to man’s loss of faith in the possibility
of final knowledge in the moral and political realm. His work, along with that of Freud and
Kariel adopts Nietzsche’s thoroughgoing relativism as
the point of departure for his own political theory, although his conclusions
remind one more of Dewey, for example, than of Nietzsche. Since we cannot know what is good or just
for men in common, the state must be indifferent to moral values and ultimate
ends. Its proper concern is the
means for insuring to each person the maximum freedom to formulate moral truth
and create visions of the good which integrate narrowly partisan, private goods.
While Nietzsche was quite willing
for the creative man, the Ubermensch, to impose his standards on lesser
men, Kariel argues that a consistent relativism will recognize the equal claim
of all human ends and pursuits. It
will permit all men to expand their range of experiences, test their
potentialities, and display themselves publicly in a variety of roles. Recognizing with Nietzsche that man
creates himself, Kariel would democratize creativity: “… we should
ultimately accept as democratic nothing less than a society all of whose members
are active participants in an interminable process - and who will not mind
such activity.”53
Kariel’s thought has a radical thrust which
distinguishes it from the political conservatism of some historicists. If human thought is unavoidably shaped
by prevailing forces, one might conclude that the appropriate political stance
is to accept and affirm all that history has foreordained for one’s time. Kariel, like Nietzsche himself, rejects
this passive acceptance of the given. An acquiescent or ironical stance toward
prevailing conditions is justifiable only if one knows with absolute certainty
that those conditions are inflexible and unyielding. Short of such knowledge, we should “make
history,” i.e., test the limits of change by opposing established realities and
certified truths. What we believe
to be real is, in large measure, our own subjective creation. We design the world of phenomena and
bestow meaning upon it. 54 When we acquiesce in established opinions
and institutions, our creativity is blocked. None of us has the freedom any longer to
be a person. We are prevented from
enjoying varied and novel experiences, playing new roles, and discovering new
potentialities. Positivistic
political science, in particular, has identified the real with the observable,
discredited speculation about alternative possibilities, and reconciled man to
his present fate. In our capacities
as citizens and as political scientists, we can know the limits that reality
places on our freedom only by testing it, by forcing it to yield: “Taking risks,
we must attempt to violate whatever is alleged to be reality, whatever
equilibrium positivists certify to be real.” 53 A political science worthy of the name will
reconceptualize the world and act to implement its new visions. It will serve as an irritant, as an
opponent of established systems and verities. Political science, as thus practiced,
will serve both to increase our knowledge by disclosing the potentialities and
limits of political life and to humanize the political sphere by enlarging the
scope for creative action. 56
We see that Kariel’s political theory embodies a
conscious, thoroughgoing relativism. Kariel understands clearly the
implications of the epistemological principles that underlie postbehavioralism.
He forces us to face squarely the
question of whether or not a relativistic position is viable. 57
51. Kariel, In Search of Authority, p.
5.
52. See Kariel, “Nietzsche’s Preface to
Constitutionalism,” which appears in revised form in In Search of Authority,
pp. 7-24.
53. Kariel, Open Systems, p. 73. Italics in the
original.
54. See especially Open Systems, p. 123, where
Kariel states: “What we single out depends on us - or, more precisely, on the
methodological conventions, conceptual frameworks, and boundaries we establish.
And since frameworks, dimensions,
and boundaries - reality-organizing principles - are man-made, the facts they
expose are contingent on what we deem right and proper, on our norms Our norms, in other words, structure
reality. Expressing our
dispositions, they dispose over facts - as well as of them. They give reality a significance it
cannot otherwise have. Our
inquiries, directed by our norms and our conventions, give meaning which reality
does not previously possess.”
55. Kariel, “Creating Political Reality,” p.
1091.
56. Kariel, Open Systen4s, pp. 121-142;
“Expanding the Political Present,” pp. 772-776; “Creating Political Reality,”
pp. 1091-1098.
57. I have put this question to Professor Kariel
and received the following reply in personal correspondence, which I quote with
permission: “Is a thorough-going relativism a viable position? Perhaps we’ll have to redefine - to
define – ‘position,’ specify what something vacuous and literally pointless
consists of, inquiring into the constitution of nothing. My only ground for not despairing
of the groundlessness of the present is ignorance, my present conviction (daily
reconfirmed) that I don’t know what is ahead, that the [future is open and empty, that, while the past is a
horror, there is still no evidence that the future must be the same. (If one is not caught in the
conventional conception of time, one can of course think of the past as equally
open, as not fully known, as not exhaustively horrible - and hence as allowing
for hope.) So I am rather pleased
by our lack of knowledge: my failure to know justifies these very words. To put it differently, I am in the
position of expectancy (a feminine posture), anticipation, waiting. It arises out of my confidence in my
ignorance - not my faith in the redeeming value of what may yet appear in the
silences and spaces before us.” He
later adds: “I should still like to maintain not that relativism is ‘viable’ but
that nothing else is.”]
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